Tag: recommend

Hidden : A Child’s Story of the Holocaust Written by Loïc Dauvillier; Illustrated by Marc Lizano Color by Greg Salsedo; Translated from the French by Alexis Siegel First Second Books, 2014. Ages 6-10; Grades 1-5. Encouraged to talk about her evident sadness, a grandmother shares her memories long hidden about her experience as a child…

Rules of Summer by Shaun Tan. Arthur A. Levine (Scholastic) 2013. “Never break the rules. Especially, if you don’t understand them.”–back cover copy. Rules of Summer, in its most simplified description, is about two brothers’ summer adventures. The story is told by Shaun Tan so there is the surreal and the incredible wordless impact of…

If the summer narrative isn’t your glass of lemonade, it isn’t mine either, but I had to see what all the raving was about and I was very pleasantly surprised. Make it your book club read. Make it the first comic you’ve decided to read if you have been harboring a mistaken belief that comics…

When Tsukuru first hears Haida’s recording of Franz Liszt’s ‘Le mal du pays,’ from the Years of Pilgrimage suite ‘Year 1: Switzerland,” it is described as “a quiet, sorrowful piece that began with a slow, memorable theme played out as single notes, then proceeded into a series of tranquil variations” (68). Tsukuru asks Haida about…

Zetta Elliott offered a free copy of her book to interested reviewers. Please do not believe that I proceeded to read and review The Magic Mirror with bias. If you’ve spent any real length of time here on ‘omphaloskepsis’, you know I’m a fair and balanced reviewer, but I felt it should be clarified nonetheless. The Magic…

“a sweeping tale of one young family fighting to find their place in the universe.” Saga : Volumes One & Two by Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples Image Comics 2012 & 2013 respectively. This waiting for the next volume to come off hold at the Library is excruciating. It isn’t that I do not have other…

The Return of Zita the Spacegirl By Ben Hatke First Second 2014. That the entirety of Ben Hatke’s The Return of Zita the Spacegirl is an epic jailbreak comes as no surprise. From the very first book in the series, Zita has been held against her will—or has she? We know her slip through the portal…

Battling Boy by Paul Pope First Second 2013. One of the things I like about superhero comics is their ability to both maintain continuity and prove regenerative. Need to reboot a character or story? Will do. Has the essence of the hero and their story really changed? No. Even so, it is still hard to break into…

The Adventures of Beekle, The Unimaginary Friend by Dan Santat (Little, Brown & Co. 2014) On a magical island, a creature is born and left to imagine the friend made especially for them. Nameless, the creature waits in increasing despair while the others meet their matches. The creature in Dan Santat’s The Adventures of Beekle is…

I’m sure someone will decide their means for being relevant will require them to pan James Gunn’s Guardians of the Galaxy (2014). They’ll claim some disconnect with the director’s work in general as their opening disclaimer or some such entry wound into their “review.” I am fine–relieved, actually–to be absorbed into the clamoring for an encore. Was…

Even though David Fincher’s The Game (1997) was a rewatch, it was almost like watching it for the first time. I remembered a few elements, but Sean wasn’t confirming the details. I was at the mercy of a slow and twisted mystery. If you haven’t seen The Game, you should stop at after the second…